--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "etherman23" <etherman23@...> wrote:
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@> wrote:
> >
> > On 2006-10-04 06:35, etherman23 wrote:
> >
> > > I was looking at some PIE roots today and noticed some
> > > interesting distributions of diphthongs.
> > >
> > > 1) Roots in *tei- are nonexistent
> >
> > Isn't this an accidental gap? There are several roots in *dei- and
> > *dHei-,
>
> That's a distinct possibility. At first I had hoped there'd be no
> roots in *dei and *dHei, but there are. If *d < *t' and *dH < *tH
> then perhaps the ejectivity and aspiration prevented the
> assibilation. Or maybe they can be explained as early borrowings.
> I haven't looked at that possibility and wouldn't seriously put
> it forward without finding a good number of extant candidates.
>
Here's something I thought of saving for later, but anyway:
Hittite version of PIE *dHeh1- "put, place"
present (hi-conj.)
1sg te-e-ih-hé OH; te-e-ih-hi OH
2sg da-it-ti OH+, MH+; ta-it-ti OH+
3sg da-a-i OH, OH+, MH+; da-i MH
1pl (ti-ya-u-e-ni NH)
2pl
3pl ti-an-zi OH, OH+, MH+; ti-an-ti OH; ti-ya-an-zi OH+
preterite
1sg te-ih-hu-un OH+, MH
2sg [da-]is^[-ta] MH
3sg da-is^ OH, OH+, MH; da-a-is^ OH+, MH+; ta-i-is^ MH
1pl da-i-ú-en MH(often); da-a-a-i-ú-en MH
2pl da-is^-te-en OH
3pl da-ir OH; da-a-ir MH; da-i-ir OH+, MH;
da-i-e-ir MH, MH+; ti-i-e-ir OH+
imperative
2sg da-i OH
2pl da-a-is^-te-en MH+
3pl ti-an-du MH+
ske-verb
zi-ik-ki; zi-ik-ki-e OH
Abbr.:
OH: Old Hittite, MH: Middle Hittite, XX+: copy later tha XX
I believe the received wisdom is that PIE *dh, *d, *t > Hittite t.
This doesn't look like that at all.
Now it's known that PIE *o > Hittite a and that PIE *dh,* d, *t >
Hittite z before *e, *i (note the ske-verb *deh1-sk^- > zikk-).
Therefore all those forms that have da- must come from *dhoh1-
(o-grade) and those in ti-, te- must come from *dHh1- (zero-grade)
where the laryngeal protects the dental from affricatization.
I think Hittite added an -i- to the verb stem (this is a classic
PIE long-vowel verb in CV:(i)-).
My interpretation
Hittite version of PIE *dHeh1- "put, place"
present (hi-conj.)
1sg dHh1-i-xi
2sg dHoh1-i-ti
3sg dHoh1-i
1pl dHh1-i-n,Weni
2pl
3pl dHh1-i-ánti
preterite
1sg dHh1-i-x-n,W
2sg dHoh1-i-s^[-ta]
3sg dHoh1-i-s^
1pl dHoh1-i-n,Wan
2pl dHoh1-i-s^-tan
3pl dHoh1-i-er
imperative
2sg dHoh1-i OH
2pl dHoh1-i-s-tan
3pl dHh1-i-antu
ske-verb
dhe-ske
I can't understand why neither Oettinger nor Jasanoff has
something to say about this distribution of root initials
(Oettinger has a chapter on it which makes no sense to me).
If my analysis is true, we should give up the idea taken
from Sanskrit that present sigular has gun.a, pl. zero-grade
of the root and instead posit the root vowel like this (but this
is the hi-, not the mi-conjugation):
1sg zero
2sg -o-
3sg -o-
1pl zero
2pl -o-(?)
3pl zero
cf u-HI/au-HI//aus^-MI "see"
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/46222
So, this is why there are no PIE roots in *tei-.
And what is more: the initial root-consonant alternated
(here d/t/z) with the ablaut. Now I have all the way believed
that this must be the case; as soon as ablaut alternation was
there, it must have started eating away at the preceding consonant,
causing confusing alternation, which made people generalize one
consonant or the other, thus creating what to us now looks like
a consonant shift, as in kentum/satem, or, in this case,
decem/taihun.
Torsten